


baby, it's cold outside

by shier



Category: iKON (Kpop)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-27
Updated: 2016-01-27
Packaged: 2018-05-16 16:23:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,814
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5832454
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shier/pseuds/shier
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>inspired mostly by <a href="http://i.imgur.com/XIzax2W.png">this</a>.</p>
            </blockquote>





	baby, it's cold outside

To no one’s surprise, they fight. A lot.  
  
The first time all hell breaks loose is when Bobby oversleeps on their fourth date. “He left me to _die_ in the cold,” Junhwe’s whinges to Donghyuk, the twentieth time his phone’d vibrated against Donghyuk’s desk. Personally, Donghyuk thinks that Junhwe’s starting to enjoy it, but he isn’t about to turn Koo Junhwe’s wrath on himself. Besides, had Junhwe been the kind of guy to self-reflect, he’d have forgiven Bobby the moment he texted back, five hours late, because he’d been catching up on the sleep he didn’t manage to get in the past three days. But by the time the flurry of texts arrived in his phone, Junhwe’d been seething in a coffee shop down the street, all too ready to turn off his phone and act like he wasn’t dating anyone.  
  
The second time they’d fought was more of a culmination of all their smaller fights: the time Junhwe dropped Bobby’s hand when they bumped into a distant relative of his (“He’s nosy as hell, I’m just saving us the trouble.”) or the time Bobby’d seen Junhwe after a long-ass study session, and instead of spreading his arms when Bobby’d launched himself at Junhwe, Junhwe’d staunchly crossed his arms and worn his best _what the hell do you think you’re doing we’re in public right now_ expression (“Really,” Hanbin had questioned, when Bobby whinged to him in private, “what did you expect getting into this?”).  
  
The second time they’d fought had less to do with the fact that Junhwe had introduced Bobby to his classmate as, “This is my friend, he knows Donghyuk too,” and more with the fact that that’s how Bobby’s really starting to feel.  
  
The third time—which had been dubbed by Hanbin, despite Bobby’s attempts to prevent it, as the Sweater Shitstorm—had lasted longer than any other fights they’d had to date.  
  
“It’s stupid, right, Jinhwan?” Bobby tries to confirm, even as he’s holding the incriminating evidence in his hand.  
  
“He does hate sharing his clothe—“ Jinhwan start, only to have Bobby quickly interrupt him by repeating, “It’s stupid, _right_?”  
  
Jinhwan rolls his eyes, and in that patient, long-suffering way of his, says, “It’s stupid. You guys should just make up. Lend him some of _your_ clothes.”  
  
“He’s never gonna wear it,” Bobby replies petulantly, dragging his hand through his recently washed hair. He looks down at the sweater that had started the raging argument which involved a considerable amount of accusation on the integrity of Bobby’s character that went something along the lines of _just because you hate doing the laundry doesn’t mean you should keep taking my shit_. Bobby just didn’t know how to respond because a) Junhwe had been irate with the amount of submissions (and by extension, the amount he’d slept) he had this week, and b) he genuinely thought that saying _wearing_ your shit _helps me sleep better_ would get him socked in the face right then and there. “It’s not even about this stupid thing.”  
  
“Look,” Jinhwan starts, and Bobby knows in his bones it’s going to be one of those I’m-older-and-I-care-for-you-so-listen-to-me talks and he doesn’t want to hear it, “it’s not my place to say these things but— have you considered remaining as friends? I mean, it’s not that you guys were— I _mean_ , after the time we went to Jeju together, you guys are better—“ Jinhwan pauses, and Bobby also knows that he’s considering his next words carefully, so he doesn’t shoot himself in the foot. “It’s just there was a lot less passive-aggressive seething going on in my room when you guys weren’t also actively making out.”  
  
And Bobby has thought about this, really, thought about this long and hard between all those arguments and between all those times Junhwe tried to pretend he didn’t exist and he concluded that, between the heat of the arguments and the cold of not being able to wake up next to a sleepy Junhwe in the morning? Yeah, the latter was by far worse.  
  
Something must show on his face, because Jinhwan sighs and says, “Or I guess I could just talk to him for you.” But Bobby’s done this enough times to know that the addition of Jinhwan’s only going to piss Junhwe off. Plus, it’s not like he can keep running to Jinhwan forever.  
  
“I got this,” he says, with a confidence he hopes is real, “I know Junhwe.”  
  
Only, it’s really starting to feel like he doesn’t.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
Christmas break rolls around and they still _have not_ resolved this issue. It’s starting to worry Bobby, a little, but they part on fairly amicable ways (namely, Bobby snapchatting Junhwe a series of pictures as he packs and Junhwe responding with a dimly lit selfie labelled _travel safely_ ) which probably doesn’t mean he’s about to find himself single on this Christmas just yet. Hanbin calls him tragic, but Hanbin’s also been the one coming back to Junhwe and Bobby’s intense make-out sessions (and once where under-the-belt shit had been going on), so Bobby thinks his opinion is hardly fair.  
  
He resolutely doesn’t think about his mountain of assignments nor his looming birthday. At the most, he could just spend the entire day sleeping and procrastinating. Que sera sera, etc. It’s not like he’s bothered, Bobby’s old enough to know that if it’s meant to be, it’ll be. And Bobby’s been in enough relationships to know that nothing good will come out of forcing it. But then he thinks of Jeju island, and of Junhwe laughing when they’d filled the rest of their friends’ shoes with marshmallows—in Bobby’s defense, they’d been drunk, and Junhwe’s really pretty when he laughs—that’d culminated in a sizeable hole in his wallet when he had to fix all the soles, and his insides feel like goo.  
  
“It means you’re a masochist,” Donghyuk informs him, after the second time he’d fought with Junhwe and was effectively banned from the room Junhwe shared with Yunhyeong. Suddenly, Kim Donghyuk—who led the blessed life of someone who’d never been staunchly ignored by Junhwe for extended periods of times and yet still remained his best friend to this day—seemed like someone Bobby should talk to. Bobby could do with a few pointers. Scratch that, Bobby _needs_ pointers.  
  
“Okay,” Bobby says, because it’s not like he hasn’t realized that he gravitates towards a certain type of people; Bobby’s comfortable with his choices, he just wants to know how to make those choices work out, “but does that make Junhwe a sadist?”  
  
“No,” comes Donghyuk’s quick reply. He takes a sip of his coffee and seems to ponder on how to fit Goo Junhwe into a sentence-long description. “He’s just... new to this.” And then Donghyuk’d patted Bobby on the back and offered absolutely no insight beyond an almost pitying smile that most people would’ve taken as a signal to run far and fast.  
  
Bobby’s just not sure if he’s stupid or brave to stay in the exact same spot.  
  
Either way, it’s not quite radio silence on Junhwe’s end, but it’s not the usual phone calls and messages and random audio snippets of Junhwe singing at the top of his lungs into the phone either. It’s a good morning selca in the toilet in place of his usual loudly obnoxious voice message (which, judging from the echo, was also probably recorded in the toilet). It’s a picture of dinner instead of a blow-by-blow account of why he can’t wait for his sister’s career to flourish so she can move out and how his aunt can’t seem to stay in her own house instead of infiltrating Junhwe’s all the time. Bobby, through hard-earned experience, knows this Junhwe well enough—it’s a Junhwe who’s mad, but doesn’t know how to stay mad.  
  
So when Bobby hears Junhwe’s voice filtering in from his kitchen some time in the middle of the night, he’s pretty sure he’s dreaming. Can you miss someone so much you start hallucinating their presence? Bobby dreamt about his grandfather for a whole week in a row when he passed away, but, well, the man _did_ die. Junhwe was well and alive and very grumpy in another part of Seoul. Not quite the same thing.  
  
He rolls over in bed and peers at his screen, grimacing when he realizes he’s lying chest-to-peel on the banana he’d consumed while watching a movie in bed earlier, and had predictably passed out. His phone tells him it’s well past midnight, and that he’s well and truly screwed because he’s received approximately fifty texts from _JunBabe!!!_ , with each message growing increasingly irritable ( _pick me up i’m outside_ and _hurry the fuck up i’m cold_ and _are you even home?_ and _this is why i don’t do nice things for you_ ). The last message came attached with a shit emoticon and a picture of Junhwe, bundled up in one-too-many layers of winter clothing, flipping Bobby the finger.  
  
(It says a lot that Bobby’s stomach does a weird flip and he laughs, thumbing the photo to save it.)  
  
Blearily, he drags a hand through his hair and tries not to break his neck getting out of bed. Mostly, he’s drawn to the sound of Junhwe’s voice or he’d have continued sleeping on that banana peel, no problems whatsoever.  
  
“–better leave some for him,” he hears Junhwe saying, just as he rounds around the kitchen, “you know how much he’ll whinge if we finish everything.”  
  
“Huh,” Bobby’s brother responds. If Bobby were more awake and less walking dead, he’d have noticed that it’s the exact tone he uses whenever someone tells him something he can’t quite believe.  
  
“Half a cake?” Junhwe continues to ramble, and _god_ how Bobby’d missed that voice. Absence makes the heart grow fucking fonder indeed. “Two-thirds? Up ’til here? Or whatever’s left? How much cake can he consume without turning into an over-excited blur?”  
  
“The hell is that supposed to mean?” Bobby asks, his grand entrance ruined somewhat by his extreme bedhead and unexpected yawn.  
  
There’s silence in the kitchen—Bobby catches his brother sniggering behind his fork—and then Junhwe asks, dryly, “You’re still alive? No one picked up your phone so I assumed you were dead.”  
  
Bobby grins, trying to rub the sleep out of his eyes so he can concentrate on the situation at hand, because here Junhwe stood in his kitchen, having travelled for _hours_ in the middle of _winter_. Bobby feels warm all over, as though he could run laps around his neighbour in his current state (i.e. with only his boxer briefs on) and emerge alive and well.  
  
“You’re here,” he starts, grinning widely. “What’re you doing here?”  
  
“You’d know if you _read my texts_ because, you know, that’s what a phone’s for,” Junhwe emphasizes once more, though he seems less angry now, less tense and pissed off and more exasperated and fond. “Happy birthday, asshole. I brought cake. Well. Three-quarters of a cake. Well—“ he twists around to assess the cake box in question, and Bobby takes this chance to advance very quickly forward, stepping right into Junhwe’s personal space “—a little over half a ca— _what’re you doing_?” He’s leaning away from Bobby now, back pressed against the edge of the table as Bobby grins up at him, hands folded behind his back.  
  
“Looking at you,” Bobby replies easily, because it feels like he can never tire of it. Because although they’ve been dating for several months, Bobby’s still cataloguing each new expression Junhwe makes. “Might be a dream. Gotta remember this well for my lonely, lonely nights.”  
  
Junhwe scoffs as Bobby’s brother slinks away into the living room with his plate. It’s a true sign of how much Junhwe misses Bobby that he slings his arm around Bobby’s neck instead of shoving him away. “You’re full of shit.”  
  
“You love that I’m full of shit,” Bobby argues smugly, pressing in even closer. “You think it’s charming.”  
  
“I think I have questionable taste,” Junhwe shoots back without missing a beat, but he’s running his hand through Bobby’s unruly hair, so Bobby’s not even remotely about to complain. “And are you _seriously_ sleeping without clothes on in the middle of winter? Do you really wanna die?”  
  
“There’s this thing in the 21st century called central heating,” Bobby says, but now that Junhwe’s pointed it out, it _is_ cold and Junhwe’s deliciously warm. “But if you’re offering to warm me up—“  
  
“I didn’t haul your cake all the way here so I can warm you up,” Junhwe interrupts immediately, although his cheeks flush a colour that has nothing to do with the cold.  
  
“We have time for cake and warming up,” Bobby insists, but Junhwe only scoffs again, patting his back condescendingly  
  
“Suck it up, birthday boy. _Don’t_ —“ Junhwe says, just as he opens his mouth to tell Junhwe what exactly he's willing to suck “—eat the godamn cake.”  
  
“Roger that,” Bobby salutes, because life is about as perfect as he can imagine it to be, right now, since he spotted Junhwe’s utilitarian luggage in the corner of the room, which can only mean that _he’s staying over_ , and yeah, Bobby doesn’t really need a birthday wish this year.  
  
“Wait,” Junhwe says, then Bobby’s getting a faceful of him and his shaky, unsure exhale that comes with every kiss after a fight and then his (slightly chapped but warm and sweet from icing and something innately Junhwe) lips are pressed against Bobby’s and his fingers are curling in Bobby’s hair and— on second thought, Bobby’s taking that wish. He needs all the luck he can get so every moment for the rest of his life can be exactly like this one. Then Junhwe's pulling away, looking slightly awkward and sheepish, and when Bobby reaches down to lace their fingers together, Junhwe's palm is slightly sweaty.  
  
But even as Junhwe begins to boss him around to carry his luggage to Bobby's room, Bobby honestly can't think of a better way to kick-start his twentieth year of being alive.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
They end up in bed with the box of cake and a fork and the leftover meat from dinner and, after Junhwe loudly declares that he requires special treatment for coming all the way here, a romcom Christmas-themed movie.  
  
“’tis the season to be fucking jolly,” Junhwe deadpans, tucking himself comfortably into Bobby’s side as the movie rolls into it’s opening scene. Bobby, who has absolutely no interest whatsoever in romcoms, whips out his phone to take a dimly lit selca of them both. “I’m not gonna ask.”  
  
“Donghyuk’s been on my ass since Christmas break started,” Bobby explains anyway, tapping away at his screen. “He worried that I might be on my last legs with you.”  
  
  
“If Donghyuk spends as much time worrying about himself instead of worrying about me, maybe his lonely ass won’t be single on Christmas,” Junhwe retorts, pinching some of the beef in the bowl beside Bobby’s hip to feed Bobby. “Besides, we don’t have problems.”  
  
Bobby pauses, unattractively enough, mid-chew, raising his eyebrows questioningly. “You don’t think we do?”  
  
There’s a short pause, then: “We fight, but that doesn’t mean we have actual _problems_.” Bobby can hear the question in his statement, the unsure way he glances up at Bobby, as if he didn’t know if they were on the same footing. “You’re not gonna start the new year by dumping me, right?”  
  
“Unless you do something drastic between now and then, I _guess_ not,” Bobby teases, tightening his arm around Junhwe’s shoulder to tuck him in even closer. He knows he’s right when he told Jinhwan “I know Junhwe”.  
  
“Fuck off,” Junhwe says fondly, letting himself be manhandled anyway. “What I’m saying is, it’s better to have these things out in the open and yell at each other than to shut up and murder each other over it. I read it in a book once.”  
  
Bobby fixes him with a look.  
  
“Okay, I saw it in a movie once, happy? The characters ended up happily married with three dogs.”  
  
“Are you saying you wanna marry me?”  
  
“I’m saying I want three dogs.” Junhwe offsets the comment with a kiss to the juncture of Bobby’s jaw, his grin bright and warm even in the dim lightly. “I brought you a present, by the way.”

"The cake isn’t it?”  
  
“Nah, I wore a different shirt every single day for the past week and brought them all along. You can sleep with that shit all you want.”  
  
Bobby snorts then, resting his temple against Junhwe’s as he tries to at least show a little interest in the movie. But if he’s being honest, he’s way too distracted to even register that the actors are actually speaking at all. “You say that, but _really_ you just want me to do your laundry.”  
  
“Happy fucking birthday,” Junhwe declares.  
  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> (and then kim jiwon wakes up to a birthday blowjob and all is indeed well.)


End file.
